The state and city appealed, and the decision was summarily affirmed by the United States Supreme Court on November 13, 1956.[4] A motion for clarification and for rehearing was denied on December 17, 1956.[5]

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Shortly after beginning the Montgomery Bus Boycott in December 1955, black community leaders began to discuss filing a federal lawsuit to challenge the City of Montgomery and Alabama bus segregation laws. They sought a declaratory judgment that Alabama state statutes and ordinances of the city of Montgomery providing for and enforcing racial segregation on "privately" operated buses were in violation of Fourteenth Amendment protections for equal treatment.

The cause of action was brought under Reconstruction-era civil rights legislation, specifically 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 1983.[6] The United States District Court had original jurisdiction to hear this case under Title 28 of U.S.C. because it is a federal question (§ 1331)[7] and because it concerns civil rights (§ 1343).[8] A three-judge district court panel was required under 28 U.S.C. § 2281[9] for the granting of an interlocutory, or permanent injunction restraining the enforcement of a state statute by restraining the action of a state officer, such as an official of the Alabama Public Service Commission. The court held that, given the admission of officials that they were enforcing state statutes, a three-judge court had jurisdiction over the case.

About two months after the bus boycott began, civil rights activists reconsidered the case of Claudette Colvin. She was a 15-year-old girl who had been the first person arrested in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus, nine months before Rosa Parks' action. Fred Gray, E.D. Nixon, president of the NAACP and secretary of the new Montgomery Improvement Association; and Clifford Durr (a white lawyer who, with his wife Virginia, was an activist in the Civil Rights Movement) searched for the ideal case law to challenge the constitutional legitimacy of Montgomery and Alabama bus segregation laws.

On February 1, 1956, Gray filed the case Browder v. Gayle in U.S. District Court. Browder was a Montgomery wife; W. A. Gayle was the mayor of Montgomery.

On June 13, 1956, the District Court ruled that "the enforced segregation of black and white passengers on motor buses operating in the City of Montgomery violates the Constitution and laws of the United States," because the conditions deprived people of equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment. The court further enjoined the state of Alabama and city of Montgomery from continuing to operate segregated buses.

The case was not completed until it was heard later that year by the US Supreme Court, as the state and city appealed the decision. On November 13, 1956, the Supreme Court upheld the District Court's ruling and ordered the state of Alabama (and Montgomery) to desegregate its buses. One month later on December 20, after Mayor Gayle was handed official written notice by federal marshals, the Montgomery buses were desegregated.